Showing posts with label Blogger. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blogger. Show all posts

Thursday, January 8, 2015

Blogging with Primary Students

This school year, a few of our elementary teachers ventured into the world of blogging with their
students.  They have been using their class blog to have students demonstrate how to do a math problem, explain what they know about a specific topic, and share their projects (artwork, tech projects, etc.).  These teachers have been using Kidblog as it was the only tool we had available at the time.  However, this fall, we purchased the app Easy Blogger Jr. (now referred to as Blogger Jr.) for the primary grades.  This tool allows students who can't type or are slow typists to post photos with an audio recording and videos.  So a Kindergarten student could collect a group of items starting with the letter for the week, take a photo, and record themselves saying the letter and identifying each item.  Blogger Jr. is a good tool for allowing young students to experience the world of blogging.

Blogger Jr. connects to Blogger for posting your student's photos, videos and typing (should your students be ready to venture into the world of typing).  As a result, you will need to do some prep work setting up a blog and activating a YouTube account for the student videos.  Fortunately, you can use your school email account to activate YouTube and set-up Blogger.  If you have never accessed the YouTube channel associated to your school email, they you will need to follow the instructions on this website - Creating a Google/Gmail and Activating YouTube.  If you are using a school email account, then begin with step #4.

Once you have your YouTube account activated, you are ready to set-up your class blog in Blogger.  The following video (click the link below the image) will walk you through setting up your class blog where students will post via Blogger Jr.  It will also show you how to add students to in the Blogger Jr. app.  Adding students into the Blogger Jr. app becomes the one time consuming task of the whole process.  You must set-up the app on each device so it connects to your class blog and you have added the student or students who will be using Blogger Jr. on that device.

Easy Blogger Jr
Prior to setting up the Blogger Jr. app, you might want to take a photo of the student(s) who will be added on the device.  For example, if Susan and Marcus are going to use iPod #1 for completing their blog posts, then I would use that iPod to take a photo of each student.  When I add them to Blogger Jr., I will put in their first name and photo.  This allows them to see their photo on the login screen of Blogger Jr.  This student photo is not posted out on the class blog, it is only for the use of the Blogger Jr. app on that one device.




Before students begin blogging, you will want to cover the basics of blogging and any rules that you would like them to follow.  This might include how to use the app, not blogging unless the teacher has asked you to, not using their name in a post, don't say anything hurtful or untrue, etc.  I'm not as artsy as my elementary teachers, but you might create your own poster with the class blogging rules as a reminder for your students.

So, you're all set-up with Blogger Jr., now how can you use this tool with students?  Here's a list of things students could blog about:

  • Photo of their artwork
  • Something new you learned today
  • Your class pet
  • Math problems using manipulatives
  • Counting Practice
  • Book Reviews
  • Reading practice
  • Making patterns
  • Tell what you know about a specific topic

Needing some additional assistance with Blogger Jr?  Here are some quick links to their support resources:
Posted by at 2 comments:
Labels: , , ,

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Blogging Platforms - Which one do I choose?

If you search Google for blogging platforms or blogging software, you'll get results back like "The Ultimate List of Blogging Platforms," "Blog Software Review 2014," and "The 15 Best Blogging Platforms on the Web Today." While most blog software is similar, your choice should be based on your needs and how you plan to use your blog. Below are the top four common blogging tools I've seen utilized by educators.

Blogger: If you are in a Google Apps for Ed school, I would recommend sticking with Blogger. It is already connected to your Google email, calendar and documents, so you don't need to create a new account. The preference settings, layout and widgets can seem overwhelming when you first start. I usually look at other educators using blogger to look at their layout and widgets. If I see something I like, I add that to my blog. I have even emailed bloggers and asked what a particular widget was if I couldn't tell by looking at it. Blogger does have a nice getting started help page that includes pictures. Atomic Learning also has a collection of video tutorials to help you through the getting started process. Blogger is good for your personal, classroom and reflection blogs. If you are a Google Apps for Ed school, this is a good blog platform to use with your high school students. It gives students their own independent blog to manage, a skill they will need for college and career readiness.  UPDATE:  I recently discovered that you can invite others to be an author on your blog.  So, if you wanted to start a blog for your class with students as contributors, you could invite them to be authors.  They have limited access to the settings and preferences for the blog, but are able to contribute blog posts without having their own blog.

Building a Blog
A. Getting Started
B. Creating the Blog

 WordPress: This is usually #1 on all the blog lists. Personally, I have not used this platform yet as I have
Google accounts and use Blogger. (Really, I didn't want to remember another username and password.) However, for the sake of this post, I did create a personal blog on WordPress. Adjusting preference settings, layout and widgets is similar to using Blogger. Atomic Learning has video tutorials to help you get started with WordPress. Like Blogger, WordPress is good for a personal, classroom or reflection blog. I would recommend this platform to students if they didn't already have a Google account.

Blogging with WordPress 3.6 Training

 A. Getting Started
C. Writing, Editing and Managing Posts

Edublog: I started using Edublog when I first explored blogging in 2007. It is commonly used among User Guide
educators. This platform works well for a class blog as it allows you to set differing roles for your students. Students can become collaborative contributors rather than having their own blog dedicated to their postings. Edublog is powered by WordPress, so if you are already using WordPress for a personal blog, this would be an easy transition for a class blog.

Kidblog: This platform has started taking off in education over the last year. It is a great platform not only getting started page provides a couple short introductory videos created by the Kidblog user community.
for your classroom blog, but also for elementary aged bloggers. As a teacher, you can set-up a classroom blog and then add your students to the users. You can have the students add themselves, but they must get the "secret code" from you so they get connected to your class. Each student gets their own blog page under your main classroom. The teacher controls when blog posts go live, who can read the posts and who can comment on the posts. Parents can also join the class with a special registration code, but this must be turned on in the setting controls. This

Remember, if you are wanting students to blog as a class or individually, then you'll want to choose a platform that provides the resources that will help you monitor their published products. We will look more at blogging with students in an upcoming post.

Please note that all four of these blogging platforms have apps available for managing and posting from your iOS device.

Posted by at No comments:
Labels: , , , ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)